Trump’s First Year: Did the Working-Class Benefit?
Donald Trump ran for president on a populist and inclusionary platform. As he campaigned across the country, he appealed to increasingly larger numbers of Americans... Read More
At What Price Common Core?
In the Kindergarten Classroom For decades, five-year-olds have been entering kindergarten with varying levels of academic proficiency. Some might be able to read. Others may... Read More
Mental Health Diagnoses
Through a Classist Lens
Many people believe that you’re born with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). As a person who has been diagnosed with ADHD myself and treated with Ritalin... Read More
A Hard Lesson about Free Money
“Congratulations, you have been awarded a scholarship by your high school foundation. You are invited to attend awards night and be recognized for your achievement,”... Read More
Is That What They Would Say?: Home Knowledge vs. School Knowledge
Two incidents from my school years illustrate the clash between home experience and school assumptions. In second grade, I was drawing in my Alice and... Read More
Privatizing Driver’s Ed: a Lesson in Disenfranchisement
When I went to high school in Wisconsin, Driver’s Ed was a required course, first in the classroom where we learned in-depth about rules and... Read More
The Unlevel Playing Field of High School Sports
I grew up thinking that even if some people were born to great privilege and others were born into much more challenging circumstances, there was... Read More
Humiliation at School Should Be a Thing of the Past
Dozens of children at a Utah elementary school had their lunch trays snatched away from them before they could take a bite last month. Salt... Read More
“Bring Enough for Everyone”: What We Lose When We Lose Public Education
Did your schoolteachers say, “Don’t bring [candy, toys, coveted items] to school unless you bring enough for everyone”? Mine did. Maybe they recognized how incapable... Read More
Philly School Crisis Meets Pushback
While a group of determined teachers, parents and community activists rallied a small crowd in front of South Philadelphia High School on a rainy weekday,... Read More
A Small Fish in a Big Pond
Junior year of high school, I was informed, was the most crucial one in laying out the roadway towards college. As one who was raised... Read More
Shame, School Lunch, and Passing
When I was in sixth grade, my family was eligible for free school lunches. I attended a small country school, without much class diversity, mostly... Read More
Class Reproduction by Four Year Olds
I watched how class played out in a preschool classroom, creating disadvantages for the already disadvantaged and privileges for those born into privilege. I spent... Read More
Overlooking luck
Can someone please explain to Newt Gingrich that people not wanting a job typically doesn’t cause poverty; being unable to get a job causes poverty. ... Read More
Hiding the lunch ticket
I was an outsider at my junior high school. Why was I ashamed of my family’s poverty? When my family lost its small business and... Read More
A 4th of July Declaration of Dependence
It’s no small irony that on the 4th of July weekend our nation’s largest union surrendered a chunk of its independence. At their annual meeting... Read More
Moving the Bar
At first glance, I thought that it was just another article about disappointing test scores. I almost didn’t click through to read it, in part... Read More
From a Teenage Class Action Fan
My name is Liora and I’m fourteen years old. I’ve attended public schools my whole life except for the last year and half when I... Read More
Learning about Class in Private School?
Like parents everywhere, we wanted to give our teenage daughter advantages we never had. High on our list was to provide her a much clearer... Read More